If I were Donald's coach preparing him for this match, I would tell him "Son, you're playing someone who just beat Federer on clay, so you might as well try something different since he's the favorite anyway:
1) More 120+ mph serves to the body, or slice to Isner's backhand, and follow them to the net. Russell had problems handling Donald's close serves, but for some reason Donald did it only once or twice a set and didn't follow them to the net.
2) Drill Isner's backhand whenever possible. His forehand is becoming lethal, and the heavy loopy topspin won't bother someone who's seems 8 feet tall.
3) Come to the net more."
Monday morning quarterbacking is always easier said then done, but if he's not the favorite, he might as well revamp his approach to the game and try out all of his weapons. Dumping in 115 mph serves and waiting for Isner to make mistakes won't work.

Only thing that will keep him in it is if he can dictate forehand to Isner's backhand rallies. Isner will have a lot of easy holds but DY will need to stay mentally strong and "Hope" he can sneak a return game on John. Main thing is to hold serve and maybe get it in tiebreaks. Very tough task and I would like to see him do it, just not sure he has the game to do it against the tall guys like John.

Isner won 7-6(3), 6-4. Thought Young played well based on the stats, was in more Isner serve games then I would've thought. Only capitalized on 1 and then got broken right back. Biggest lapse he had during the match. Other than that I thought he gave himself a good shot, but just too much from Isner. Good sign from Young though moving forward he knows he can play decent against tall guys where as before he was getting taken to the woodshed by them. Lets see what kind of draw he gets at Delray Beach, and what he's able to do with it.

Sounds like a close match that came down to a few breaks. Not much margin of error if your opponent serves 22 aces. Looks like he went deep in points on a number of Isner's service games, so he must have stepped it up. He's not defending a lot of points from this stretch last year so he still has a chance to pick up some ground.

Isner reports that he struggled early on and he was out of position on every shot. Perhaps DY executed a game plan that disrupted his rhythm. At any rate, DY kept it competitive. This gives me more hope for next week and beyond.

I would favor DY in this match. I think he has a 60% chance of beating Sweeting. It's interesting that they've only played three times, despite covering the same Challenger events up to less than a year ago.

Sweeting needs the win more than DY. He has a ton of points dropping off soon, and unless he wins a lot of matches now, he is poised to take a mighty tumble out of the top 100.

I would say its more 50-50. This is the kind of match Young needs to pull out the W. Sweeting beat him pretty good in their last match although Donald's form at the time was pretty low. Hopefully he sticks to the Prince frames and doesn't have some different one this tournament. One thing is for sure it'll be a nerve-racking match to watch if you cheer him.

So DY is playing Indian Wells next week, where (hope I'm wrong but) I predict he will lose Round 1 in maddening fashion. He then plays Miami. But...for the next tournament, he has NOT entered Houston. He has entered Casablanca!

Of all the tennis tournaments, in all the towns, in all the world, he walks into that one. He is the only American entered. At least he won't lose to the usual suspects like Russell and Sweeting. Casablanca - play it once, play it again.